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The opening page of t2k's great-great-great-grandpappy, theaterhead 1.0, which launched January 5, 1998... A new year seems always to bring out new lists of predictions in just about every field and topic imaginable, including theater. Don't worry, this isn't one of them. But I have been thinking about what I would like to see happen in Orange County theater over the coming year, what additions, what changes, plus what I think works and would like to see continue and flourish. And so, my Wish List for 1998 follows. Not a list of predictions, nor a list of complaints, nor even wishes without a sound pragmatic grounding, such as a Wallace Shawn play coming anywhere closer than a full tank of gas. No, my wishes are few, simple, and I think all well within range of actually coming true. It will just take some application here and there. That said, I offer the following, in no particular order of value or urgency... 1). A local playwright steps up with a play that grasps the zeitgeist of our millennium's end. The play may be flawed, it may not be definitive, it may not even be in English, but it is a play of vision and great passion, a unique theatrical voice that speaks to us all of what we want and what we fear. 2). A local theatre steps up and supports on a regular basis the original full-length plays by local playwrights. Speaking as a wishful playwright, I would love to have a theatre to call home, a constant space that would invest in each peculiar gestation of my plays no matter how twisted and tortured the process may be. 3). And if this theatre is not forthcoming, someone steps up and creates one. 4). The local theater scene awakens to both the changing demographics of the County and the steady depletion of its audience. Each time I see an OC demographic pie chart, larger pieces are going to Hispanics and Asians, yet OC theater remains almost exclusively about white folks. And even within that, creaky North Atlantic comedies and the anguished travails of tortured East Coast academics at thirty to forty bucks a head speak little of relevance to a local audience born in the second half of this century, let alone those in their teens or early twenties. 5). That the current glut of ten-minute disposable play readings swiftly dissipates and the reading process returns to what it is really meant to be: a useful developmental tool for the playwright, not a quick-fix substitute for production. 6). A stake is driven righteously through the ever-palpitating heart of A.R. Gurney's Love Letters and it is launched to sea aboard a flaming pyre, never to be seen again upon an OC stage. 7). The enviable, infectious drive and energy that is Stages in Anaheim is bottled and made available to all at affordable prices. That's it. Just a few simple wishes I hope to at least begin to see realized as 1998 unfolds. |